7 Shows Streaming On Netflix That Tackle Moral Goodness

What does it mean to be a good person? Housewives demonstrate moral goodness by taking care of their kids and managing an endless to-do list. Couples feel they are good people by supporting their partner in a relationship. Faith and religion serve as the morally guiding hand to many individuals.

But what about those people who aren’t really ‘bad’ people but consistently make… questionable decisions? How do they define ‘goodness?’ By the same token, villains appear evil with morally ambiguous principles, yet we often see moral goodness in their loyalty to their families.

A Brief Explanation Of Moral Goodness In Television

In an effort to uphold one’s own sense of morality, on-screen characters frequently sacrifice their mental health to please others. When they bend the rules of ‘goodness,’ they can face psychologically damaging consequences. As a result, they warp their own worldview. Much like reality, fictional characters can sabotage their relationships with others in their personal quest for fulfillment. From romantic-comedies to criminal dramas, here are some live-action shows streaming on Netflix that follow the lives of characters who reap the repercussions of trying to maintain – or deviate from – their perceived concept of moral goodness.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

The CW‘s musical-comedy drama television show, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, showcases a woman with mental health issues. Rebecca strives for the appearance of moral goodness – her idea of it, anyway. Nevertheless, Rebecca suffers from anxiety, depression, and wallows in her own loneliness. Regardless of Rebecca’s success, her mother cripples her with criticism and unrelenting expectations. Rebecca sacrifices her own happiness at the expense of appearing as a morally good person to her mother, colleagues, and clients.

In New York, Rebecca runs into Josh Chan (Vincent Rodriguez III) – an ex-boyfriend from high school she never moved on from. Immediately, she reflects on her moral identity and lack of fulfillment in her life in New York. Hence, Rebecca decides to secretly follow Josh across the country to West Covina, California in hopes she might find happiness with him.

Interior Vs. Exterior Moral Goodness

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend subverts the stigma around the demoralizing term, “crazy ex-girlfriend.” Throughout the first season, Rebecca pursues Josh to an extreme extent. Rebecca exploits anyone to uphold the facade of moral goodness to mask her internal and mental afflictions. Rebecca is all about appearances. She wants to appear like a desirable love interest for Josh, despite the fact that Josh already has a girlfriend.

Rebecca continually feels anxious about her own physical appearance. She tries to befriend Josh’s new girlfriend, Valencia Perez (Gabrielle Ruiz), by feigning interest in Valencia as a person. If others perceive Rebecca as a good person who demonstrates moral goodness, she feels she might evolve into exactly what they want her to be.

Motivated By Morality

Naturally, Rebecca strives for acceptance from those around her. Rebecca initially comes across as a morally challenged, selfish individual. Regardless, she ultimately wants to be seen as a good person. To achieve this, Rebecca is motivated by her quest to overcome her own insecurities. She pathologically lies to Josh about moving to West Covina (where Josh just happens to be). She manipulates her new friend Paula Proctor (Donna Lynne Champlain) in Rebecca’s pursuit of Josh (after everything she’s done for Rebecca that she didn’t ask for).

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is a commentary on the psychological and physiological effects of neglecting mental health. It featured unforgettable song and dance musical performances as a bonus! Rebecca transforms from a flawed female protagonist obsessed with men, sex, and appearances into a self-reflective woman who values herself, challenging her perception of moral goodness. You can stream all four delightfully musical seasons of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend on Netflix.

Jane the Virgin

The CW’s romantic and satirical telenovela show Jane the Virgin features Jane Villanueva (Gina Rodiguez), who bases her entire moral code around upholding her Catholic faith. Jane’s religious vow not to engage in pre-marital sex proved most significant in her desire to achieve moral goodness.

Her boyfriend, Michael Cordero, Jr. (Brett Dier), respects her desires, taking pride in Jane’s faithfulness to moral goodness. However, Jane’s life shatters when discovering she’s been accidentally artificially inseminated during a routine pap smear. Consequently, Jane becomes pregnant. But she’s never had sex!

Faith & Fear In Goodness

Jane finds herself facing the challenges of both an unwanted pregnancy and resisting the temptations of pursuing the wealthy, worldly Rafael Solano (Justin Baldoni) – the father of her artificially inseminated baby. Subsequently, the pregnancy skews Jane’s perception of moral goodness in her desire to stay true to her faith, her boyfriend, and her own sanity. Simultaneously, Jane also struggles with balancing love and resentment toward her judgmental but caring grandmother, Alba Villanueva (Ivonne Coll).

Alba persistently influences Jane – whether Jane likes it or not – when Jane strays from the Catholic code of goodness. Jane’s love for her family and commitment to religion guide Jane’s enterprise of maintaining moral goodness. However, when Jane decides to pursue her morally deviant baby daddy, Rafael, she deals with unintended consequences from her family of abandoning her loving, long-time boyfriend, Michael.

 “I just needed to prove I can do it myself now, because I’m going to have to do things myself now!”

– Jane Villanueva, Jane the Virgin, Season 1: Chapter Twenty

Balance In The Faithful Code Of Moral Goodness

Undoubtedly, Jane’s moral code drives her motivations. Her relationships with her family and significant others succeed and fail according to Jane’s personal decisions. Jane the Virgin illustrated the positive and negative effects of pushing beyond the boundaries of one’s ingrained worldview. Accordingly, both Jane’s consciousness and her family help guide her during the newness of pregnancy and unexpected relationships. Likewise, Jane’s devotion to her faith allows her to overcome mental barriers to fully blossom into a resilient woman capable of making her own decisions about moral goodness. All five fast-paced seasons of Jane the Virgin can be found streaming on Netflix.

Mindhunter

Part of Netflix’s original true-crime drama series, Mindhunter, highlights young FBI Agent Holden Ford’s (Jonathan Groff) unique relationship with convicted serial killer Ed Kemper (Cameron Britton). Based on the real-life co-ed killer, Holden’s interview with the amicable Ed Kemper morphs into a psychologically afflicting obsession with social deviancy. Consequently, Holden’s perception of moral goodness becomes irrevocably altered. Specifically, Holden worked as a teacher at the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit in the late 70s when psychology research first emerged.

Agent Bill Tench (Holt McCallany) eventually accompanied Holden when talking with imprisoned serial killers to help better understand their thought process. Essentially, Holden hunts aberrant, unusual minds for research development. But Holden finds killer Ed Kemper’s calm demeanor intriguing, transforming Holden’s grasp on understanding how Ed makes evil morals sound reasonable. Holden excels in criminal negotiation – but fails to negotiate his own emotional responses.

Morality In The Face Of Evil

“Butchering people is hard work. Physically and mentally. I don’t think people realize. You need to vent.”

– Ed Kemper, Mindhunter, Season 1: Episode 2

Holden’s job involves probing the minds of multiple serial killers for psychological research. Inadvertently, his own mind incessantly wanders back to Ed Kemper. When Holden asks how Ed killed his mother, Ed voices every gory detail of her murder like a speech. Accordingly, Ed’s peaceful manner of speaking almost convinces Holden that Ed rationalizes his grisly murders as his own acts of moral goodness. Kemper, along with other convicted murderers, see themselves as the victims. As a result, Holden struggles to understand how such heinous criminal acts of violence can come from a man so morally insightful.

Because Holden interacts with evil every day, his viewpoint toward moral goodness in murderers pervades his mind. His philosophical girlfriend, Debbie Mitford (Hannah Gross), struggles to nurture Holden’s behavior. Holden begins to draw further away from Debbie and becomes more obsessed with psychological morality. Mindhunter illustrates the effects of how ambiguous moral goodness affects Holden’s psyche, the trauma leaving him unable to form emotional connections. The first two mind-probing seasons of Mindhunter are streaming on Netflix. The cast was released from their contracts, although production of a third season may still be plausible.

The Punisher

Arguably, Jessica Jones and Daredevil also portray characters with traumatically induced moral codes, but Netflix’s original team up with Marvel’s The Punisher gives audiences a jarring depiction of Frank Castle‘s skewed quest for moral goodness by exacting revenge and attaining justice. Because Frank’s family was murdered, Frank Castle kills victims connected to the murder of his family without hesitation when he finally hunts them down.

Fundamentally, Frank’s morals align with his character. Frank wants nothing more than to reverse the death of his family. However, Frank engineers the deaths of his family’s murderers to avenge them. Through his revenge, Frank attempts to justify the deaths of these men as an act of moral goodness that would please his deceased family.

Frank’s Moral ‘Goodness’ For Revenge

“People think that torture is pain. It’s not pain, it’s time.”

“Frank Castle: The Punisher,” Season 1: Episode 3

Ironically, Frank murders without a second thought yet avoids death at all costs. Frank needs to live in order to exact retribution for the murder of his family. Along with experiencing daily grief over the loss of his loved ones, Frank suffers from PTSD from his time in the war. Frank’s past involvement with violence and brutal murder as a soldier only further fuels his moral longing to make the world safer for the innocent. In this manner, Frank kills those who threaten the lives of morally good individuals.

Still, death and memories of his days as a soldier haunt Frank. His mental instability skews his moral code. Frank punishes the guilty to requite the innocent. The Punisher examines the mental effects of PTSD, death, loss, and revenge in Frank Castle’s traumatized outlook toward the world of immorality he must survive in. You can view both brutal seasons of The Punisher on Netflix. Netflix, unfortunately, canceled the show after its second season, along with its other collaborative shows with Marvel.

Narcos

Narcos, another Netflix original true-crime-thriller drama, features DEA agents Steve Murphy (Boyd Holbrook) and Javier Peña (Pedro Pascal) as they endure the physical and mental toll of unsuccessfully capturing Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar (Wagner Moura). Steve and Javier represent the elite of the DEA force, proving their moral goodness as individuals and in their work.

Steve’s voice-over gives audiences insight into the complex relationship the agents experience with their task of apprehending Pablo Escobar. Thus, the men fight against powerlessness as good people in their battle with Pablo’s murderous, intelligent moral code. At the same time, Steve and Javier wrestle with fidelity to the morally inconsistent cultural barriers they encounter between the American and Colombian governments.

Survival Of Moral Goodness In An Immoral World

Primarily, Steve and Javier must capture the morally unafraid Pablo Escobar. DEA agents must halt violence in Columbia and limit the amount of cocaine entering the U.S. Since the men must balance this with also tracking down the biggest drug kingpin in South America, they find themselves overwhelmed in achieving moral goodness for the country; In opposition, the notorious Pablo Escobar murders any man, woman, or child blocking his goals. Steve and Javier risked their lives during multiple drug raids that ultimately led them to frustrating failure. Pablo, always thinking further ahead than his enemies, removes all power of reliance on intelligence from Steve and Javier. Their work as men morally committed to their jobs leaves them mentally and physically exhausted.

Steve and Javier grapple with upholding the laws, faithfulness to personal morals, and keeping their relationship with one another intact in their fight toward success. The first two seasons of Narcos featuring Steve Murphy and Javier Peña are streaming on Netflix. The third season shifts its focus onto the Cali Cartel, and the series was rebooted on Netflix as Narcos: Mexico.

Good Girls

On the NBC series Good Girls, mother-of-four Beth Boland (Christina Hendricks), her sister, single mom Annie Marks (Mae Whitman), and Beth’s best friend Ruby Hill (Retta), the mother of a cancer child, justify committing a crime for the sake of their families. Ruby, Annie, and Beth all decide to rob the store Annie works at, sacrificing their moral goodness to save their families financially.

Women view themselves as good people who work tirelessly to keep their kids safe and secure. Because Beth needs to pay her house mortgage, Annie needs to hire a custody lawyer, and Ruby needs to secure a kidney for her dying daughter, they agree to a robbery. Consequently, the women’s morally questionable decision places a physical target on their heads.

It’s (Not So) Good To Be Bad

“Let me just say. It’s one thing to wash fake cash or rob a grocery store. But there is a line here. And if you cross it, you can’t come back.”

Ruby Hill, Good Girls, Season 1: Episode 9

Although motivated by morally good intentions, Beth, Any, and Ruby quickly face life-threatening consequences after they steal more money than they’d ever see in their lifetimes. Gang-member Rio (Manny Montana) nearly murdered a woman for stealing his washed cash he had filtered through Annie’s job. As a result, the three women wind up working directly for the deeply connected gang leader. Without revealing plot points, the women begin washing counterfeit bills for Rio day and night to merely stay alive.

Accordingly, the psychological impact of the threat of death and engaging in illegal activity is immense. Their illegal behavior challenges the women’s fidelity to moral goodness as mothers and individuals. Each episode of Good Girls introduces a new deterrent toward Beth, Ruby, and Annie after they get comfortable leaning into their new morally ambiguous roles as financially successful criminals. The first two seasons of Good Girls are streaming on Netflix. Season 3 ends on NBC on May 3, 2020. You can find the most recent episodes of the third season the NBC app or on Hulu.

The Good Place

Eleanor Shellstrop (Kristen Bell) in the NBC sitcom The Good Place represents the most explicit example of the ethical struggle between achieving moral goodness and succumbing to inherent human character flaws. After a row of grocery carts murdered Eleanor, she woke up in ‘The Good Place’ reminiscent of the concept of heaven. However, Eleanor quickly realized there’d been a crucial error in the system. She recalled her own controversial lack of commitment towards life as a ‘good person’ back on Earth.

Wrestling with a new version of morality, Eleanor cannot resist the temptations of living eternity in a version of paradise. Meanwhile, Eleanor chooses to confide in her “Good Place” soulmate, former ethics professor Chidi Anagonye (William Jackson Harper). In a morally good effort to secretly earn her an honest spot in ‘The Good Place,’ Eleanor must change her view of moral goodness.

How To Be Morally ‘Good’

Essentially, The Good Place comments on ethics; what defines the term ‘good.’ Eleanor’s character highlights the idea that anyone can change their worldview. Most importantly, Eleanor represents people in the realm of complacency. Eleanor was a selfish, emotionally detached woman on Earth but didn’t commit any morally unsound crimes. She embodies character traits one should try to emulate by not conforming to other’s expectations of her.

In addition, Chidi serves as much more than a mentor character to a morally compromised Eleanor. Chidi brings his own moral goodness into question by Eleanor’s mere presence in an eternal place of purity. The series dives deep into a conversation about morality – both physical and metaphysical. We empathize with the emotional afflictions Eleanor experiences as she engages with a fresh perspective on what it means to be a good person. You can stream the first three forking seasons of The Good Place on Netflix. The last few episodes of Season 4 can be watched on the NBC app or on Hulu.